Others present: City Manager Barbara Goodrich and City Attorney Sterling Solomon.

The following individuals addressed the Council regarding the FOSPR petition, noting that they have brought back a revised petition.

•Jack Welch
•Dr. Chuch Hammersley
•Rose Houk
•Jan Blackman
•Andy Fernandez

Comments received included:

•Asks that the Council reconsider the petition; it is important

Mr. Solomon noted that it was on the agenda for next week.

Comments continued:

•They have been working hard over the last year, over 96 hours of meetings with the community
•They started with 18 projects totally $82 million, and have vetted it down to 16 projects at $52 million
•The intent has always been a collaboration between the City, Parks and Recreation and the community
•They are now down to 6 projects at $45 million including maintenance costs
•They also reduced it a year from 16 to 15 years
•It is all about the real estate; supports Councilmembers Barotz and Putzova

Mr. Blaschke reviewed the issues before the Legislature, reviewing some of the current bills of interest:

Veterans Home - They heard that the President signed the budget so there should be enough funding for all of those on the priority list. Flagstaff was ranked 41 and Yuma was one behind them. They are now waiting to hear from Washington DC about the award letter. 

Mayor Evans reported that she got a call from Victor Daniels with the Arizona Department of Veteran Affairs and he mentioned that the VA is in the process of finalizing some of their design work and should have that done within the next 4-5 months, and then they will have the public participation process. She said that one thing he mentioned was that it was not cost effective to do a 60-bed home. They are now looking at 80-100 beds.

Mr. Blaschke said that staff is still working on the letter re the Hopi-Navajo Land Settlement.

He reported that the City did not win the Tiger Grant for the Fourth Street project; only Nogales won a grant in Arizona.

Mr. Blaschke said that during their lobbying trip they met with the Director of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He is putting in his budget requests this year and staff is working on those details with him, which is great news. He said that the Director would come to Flagstaff and talk with the Council and community stakeholders.

He reported that next week there is a tentative roundtable scheduled by Congressman O'Halleran to discuss uranium mining.

Councilmember Putzova said that there is going to be a citizenship question on the 2020 census and the Conference of Mayors, of which the City is a member, wrote a letter to the Department of Commerce arguing that the question discourages immigrants from participating in the census. She asked what Flagstaff is doing about it. California is suing over the question and she asked what Flagstaff's role as a City is to ensure that all people are properly counted.

Ms. Goodrich said that she was not aware of the issue. The City has been working with Coconino County on the 2020 Census. She said that they were going to have a presentation at the Joint Meeting on May 22. Councilmember Putzova said that this clearly got missed. The City is a member of a national organization and she asked how they can make sure the City has a national voice.

Mayor Evans said that was not something she was paying attention to. In 2010 this was an issue of people not being counted; it was right after SB1070 passed and a lot of people chose not to be counted because they were terrified. She said that it is interesting that there were numerous mayors from across the country and the feds still included the question. She said that it should be added to their federal legislative packet and they should be fighting against it.

Councilmember McCarthy said that if California is suing on the issue, it may make sense for Flagstaff to file an amicus brief. A majority of Council directed staff to look into this further.

Michael  Ferloino, Aspen Deli, said that because of the kickback seen in Washington they got rid of the question on the general census, but they put it on the extended version.

Water Services Director Brad Hill recognized Steve Camp, Regulatory Compliance Manager, whose program administers the agreements. He briefly reviewed the PowerPoint which addressed:

Discussion and possible revision
DISCUSSION HIGHLIGHTS
F.A.I.R. of Councilmember Putzova
Ordinance 2002-07 adopted 2002 in response to change in state law in February 2001
Changed Reclaimed Wastewater to Reclaimed Water
Created three new types of reclaimed agreements and established their rates
     Reclaimed Water
     Conversion Agreement
     Reimbursement Agreement

ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY
Law changed in 2001; prior to that they were tied to a Aquifer Protect Permit which was renewed every five years
Cities were required to have a legally enforceable agreement with the customer and then submit it to ADEQ
ADEQ was responsible for compliance with each customer

After 2001, it created five classes of water and was no longer tied to Aquifer Protection Permit
Created Type 3 General Permit to be held by City; no longer submitted to ADEQ
Required cities to take on enforcement of customers' compliance with state laws

Discussion was held on the process today. Mr. Hill said that he sent out a blast to his contacts around the state. Gilbert and Peoria have a reclaimed water system like Flagstaff does; a loop with a bunch of customers. Scottsdale has a contract to deliver to a bunch of golf courses that they paid into. They are not quite like the rest of the cities. All of them have financial implications and they go through the Council. He said that in Gilbert they took the reclaimed water agreement template to the Council for approval and then the Public Works Director approves them. With Peoria, the Council approved the agreement template and then the Utility Director has authority to do so.

Mr. Hill said that the City has 72 Reclaimed Water Agreements and 38 customers. Mr. Hill said that any agreements outside the City limits come to the Council by Code. It goes to the Water Commission and then to Council, but that is only for the initial agreement; not the renewal.

Councilmember Putzova said that she would like to propose that all of the agreements come back before Council for approval.

Councilmember Overton said that they have agreements with templates and it is important that they continue. He has no interest in reviewing the Reclaimed Water Agreements. As long as they set good policy and the rate structure he was fine with the current process. He did agree that the out of City agreements should come before Council.

Councilmember McCarthy said that there are certain Reclaimed Water Agreements for out of the City limits of extreme interest to the public and he believed that both the initial agreement and renewals of those agreements should come back to the Council.

Councilmember Odegaard said that he was not interested in looking at this issue. When a new out-of-city customer comes forward, they come to the Council at that time. A new Council may want to do it different. He thought that they had competent staff to look at their agreements; he was fine with where it is today.

Councilmember McCarthy said that the one thing he would like to bring up is that conditions change. It was not long ago that reclaimed water was considered trash. Then it came to using it on golf courses. He believes that with the evolution of the reclaimed water they need new public input.

After further discussion, a majority of Council agreed to bring this issue back to a future agenda for discussion of all reclaimed water agreements.

Community Investment Director David McIntire said that this had come forward from a previous F.A.I.R. He said that staff has been providing Council with quarterly updates. Additionally, they have business organization Meet and Greets, local First of Arizona monthly mixers, the Chamber has ribbon cuttings and the Sharkes in Space, Moonshot Mondays, business open houses from NACET.

He said that they have provided Council business tours of Joy Cone and Swire and previously presented updates on August 29, November 28, 2017 and February 27, 2018.

Mayor Evans said that she had in mind using the 4th Tuesday in the 5 Tuesday months to go out into the community and speak with the businesses. Majority of Council agreed to move this forward.

A break was held from 7:23 p.m. to 7:32 p.m.

Traffic Engineer Jeff Bauman gave a PowerPoint presentation which addressed:

SLEDS PROJECT UPDATE
Introductions
Background/History
Completed Tasks
In Progress
Next Steps
Questions/Discussion

Mr. Bauman noted that they have been advertising the testing of new equipment in different parts of the City. Councilmember Overton said that he was glad to see them testing in different areas.

City Manager Barbara Goodrich began the presentation noting that they would first hear from FMPO Manager Dave Wessel, then from Chairman of the Citizens Transportation Tax Commission (CTTC) Nick Kraft and, unfortunately, Alan Maguire was unable to join them this evening.

COUNCIL DIRECTION REGARDING TRANSPORTATION TAX
PROMISES MADE/PROMISES KEPT - TRANSPORTATION 2000
CTTC RECOMMENDATIONS
PROJECT OVERVIEW
COUNCIL DIRECTION AND DISCUSSION OF NEXT STEPS

05/30/2017 - Discussed possible direction
07/05/2017 - Adopted Ordinance 2017-25 forming the CTTC
09/05/2017 - CTTC members were selected

SUBJECT MATTER EXPERTS

Dave Wessel then continued the presentation:

PROMISES MADE AND KEPT
Prop 400 - Safe to School
Prop 401A/B - Fourth Street Railroad Overpass and Bond
Prop 402 - Transit Service Enhancements
Prop 403 - Traffic Flow and Safety Program, Roads, Intersections, Signal Synchronization

COMMISSION MEETINGS OVERVIEW
1 - 8 meetings
$900 million in projects identified, cut to $400 million
Felt obliged to Council to propose $158 million keeping the existing tax rate

Chairman Nick Kraft then continued the presentation.

Councilmember Barotz asked Mr. Kraft what the mission of the commission was that was expressed to them at the first meeting. Mr. Blaschke said that they started with review of the resolution that the Council passed as the foundation, to bring recommendations to the Council on transportation project priorities and alternatives.

Mr. Kraft recognized staff and members of the Commission, thanking all of them for the amount of work put in. He said that the Commission took public testimony, heard from Sustainability, Transportation Commission, several private groups and individuals, expert testimony, etc. They deliberated about the future of transportation needs and considered hundreds of individual project segments.

After that, while being mindful of the resolution from the Council, the commission was recommending two options:

Proposal A
Proposal B

He said that they considered bonding which would allow projects to be expedited, but they decided against it because of the additional costs. In addressing congestion, Milton is a state route and ADOT is currently in the midst of a study; therefore, the Commission focused on other ways to relieve congestion.

Discussion was then held on various proposed projects and possible funding.

The following individuals then addressed the Council:

•Jeff Goulden
•Mark Haughwout
•Brian Petersen
•John Koltenstein
•Dara Marks Marino
•Rick Moore
•Emma McVeigh

Comments received included:

•Just moved to Flagstaff 1 1/2 years ago and is active with hiking, biking, trails, etc.
•While FUTS goes a long way toward addressing the needs of trails, there is much more to be done
•Asking Council to increase the amount of funding for bike and pedestrian improvements
•The proposed amount of funding is only 93% of the pedestrian/bike plans for the next five years, and provides nothing after that
•Field of Dreams - if they put more money into roads, they will attract more cars and more congestion
•Less cars - more bikers and walkers
•Here as a member of the Bicycle Advisory Committee who had submitted a letter
•Sustainability Commission member, highly supportive of the tax; however, they would encourage Council to reconsider - Option C - stay away from making a decision a start a new process that encompasses sustainability from the start
•The CTTC did not have enough of a conversation about evidence from other cities
•There has to be a certain level of density for a bus system to work

Discussion was held on the issue of density. It was noted that the Regional Plan addresses the need for density, but then projects are proposed with density that everyone opposes. It was noted that there are different types of density; it does not all have to be monolithic structures.

Further discussion was held on the comments being presented by the members of the Sustainability Commission and the suggestion that a decision be postponed.

Comments continued that included:

•They had 15 people invest their lives in the commission and they have concrete suggestions
•The issue of housing was not involved; this is being done in a silo
•Should have a much greater focus on providing more non-motarized transportation options
•Believes that the process was flawed in the sense that they did not have clearly laid out objectives from the beginning on how Flagstaff is going to deal with climate change

Mr. Wessel said, as a preface, that as they were meeting as staff with the former city manager and discussing the approach to the commission, the commission was not so much the conduit for public input, but 15 members from a cross section of the community. There were opportunities at the beginning of every meeting for public input. There was a limit put on the staff and Sustainability Commission; it was agreed that a letter would be written.

Mr. Kraft said that the climate change issue was not heavily emphasized in the process, but they did hear from a member of the Sustainability Commission as a public participant. He said that they had 15 members drawn from a wide variety of perspectives. Tonight they are hearing from one aspect, but the commission had other voices. They tried to take a balanced approach based on the consensus of the group.

Councilmember McCarthy said that the letter from the Sustainability Commission suggests that the Council "initiate a new commission", throwing out all the work the CTTC did and start over. He was wondering if there could be a middle ground to have the CTTC hold one or two more meetings.

Ms. Goodrich noted tht the Working Calendar has the calling of the election and ballot language scheduled by June 19. The original ordinance that established the CTTC had it end the end of March so there would have to be an amendment with first and second read, etc. to continue the commission.

Further discussion was held on whether to reconvene the CTTC. Councilmember Overton said that they do not have a lot of time. They should go back to the basis of how they arrived at their decisions. Every planning document was available; every professional staff member that drafted those documents over the last dozen years was available. He feels that they had a good cross section. There are always going to be conflicting values. He said that this was a transportation tax-specific renewal question. There are a lot of lenses to look at it through and it is short-sighted to say they did not take those things into account.

He said that at this hour and at this point, he is surprised by the amount of pushback by Council. He is ready to move forward; he appreciates the commission's work and appreciates the comments. Councilmember Odegaard agreed; the question has to be asked this year.

Councilmember Putzova said that she was not opposed to going back to the commission and reconvening, and adding what has been missing. It is important to structure the projects to incentivize increasing housing density, reducing greenhouse emissions and reducing congestion. Mr. Kraft said that is the Council's job to do after the CTTC gives their recommendation.

Mayor Evans thanked the members of the CTTC and apologized for the lack of clarity they were hearing tonight.

Vice Mayor Whelan thanked the CTTC members. She said that she watched the streaming and there was a broad discussion; bike and pedestrian was always part of the consideration by three ot four commission members at every meeting.

Discussion was held on the transit question and further logistics of getting the CTTC back together. In the end, it was agreed that staff would provide more information on April 10, having a conversation with housing.

Mayor Evans said that she had a meeting with a resident in University Heights who has been experiencing numerous problems with trash, parties, etc. and they are requesting assistance from the City. She said that staff is working on setting up a meeting with the NAU liaison, PD and ParkFlag.

Councilmember Odegaard said that there is also an issue with bikes going to wrong way on San Francisco and Beaver.

Mayor Evans reported that she would not be at the meeting next week as The National League of Cities and invited her to participate in a focus group on preemptions. She said that they invited 25 US mayors to discuss tools necessary to counter preemption at the state level. She said that Ms. Goodrich will be joining her and the trip is fully being paid for by the National League of Cities.

Ms. Goodrich reported that staff is planning the budget retreat, which will be held on a Tuesday/Wednesday, with no Regular Metering.

Councilmember Odegaard wished everyone a Happy Easter on Sunday.

 The Work Session of the Flagstaff City Council held March 27, 2018, adjourned at 10:16 p.m.